


Hidden Where the Light Meets the Veil

by LostInQueue



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, F/M, Gen, HEA because I love them, Halloween, More tags to be added, Rey is a ghost and mad about it, Rose teaches kindergarten and cant stand it, Trick or Treating, its a Halloween Miracle, monster story
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-20
Updated: 2020-10-28
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:01:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27114368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LostInQueue/pseuds/LostInQueue
Summary: A story of which Rey met the man of her dreams and woke up as a ghost. She spends a few years trying to get herself together and move on but the memory of him lingers, despite the desperation she feels not to remember. Deep down she knows they screwed up, but the fact remains... he left her there, alone. Will she ever find out why?(I swear on all things holy he didn't do anything weird. This is not a dark fic. I promise, I promise, I promise!)
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 6
Kudos: 22
Collections: Fall Fic Exchange 2020





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [GodspeedRebels](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GodspeedRebels/gifts).



The whole month of October outside of the veil is a wonderous time for non-monsters who act like little minions themselves, to go on about dressing up like their favorite characters, going to Halloween parties and looting candy dishes for knocking on their doors and spouting three simple words: Trick or Treat.

Never once did she think she’d be here in the veil to see what Halloween meant for the creatures there. Hell, she never thought there would be a day, or night that she would be able to prove the veil even existed until, well, three years ago.

It was a freak accident, she still tells herself. 

It’s a lie but the only way she can deal with the heartbreak of being pulled in and then thrown out immediately after.

That lie helped her disappear from the life she knew while he retreated with her into it, changing her life forever.

Rey let’s herself remember only clips of a time she thought he loved her. In those times he said he did by mouth and action. He’d wind her up and let her out of her very being with every fiber of himself, but even that hadn’t lasted. She told herself it wouldn’t. No man stayed like he proposed to, and when all was said and done, he’d left her in this strand world between worlds as a ghost of herself. 

As it turned out, being one wasn’t so bad. She didn’t feel the weight of the world so fully on her shoulders. It lightened her mood and worry, and eventually landed her a home with several beings quite like her. Finn, who oddly, she thought, was literally named given the unnatural size of his dorsal fin standing feet above the small pudgy body atop a couple of feet that looked large for him but worked well for movement in the grand scheme of things. He had fluttering fins on either side that looked like hands too but wound up being more for show than actual use. She’s almost positive they help his equilibrium but even that she’s not sure about. 

Rose was another, again, aptly named not for her physical form but for her color. She was at least recognizable as half person half octopus, if that’s what she could really call her. The woman had tentacles but Rey found that it was taken as a personal challenge to stare, and had been in enough arguments with others not to do it with her. The best she could do was guess. If Rose looked like an octopus, she had an estimated eight tentacles, plain and simple. What was interesting about her was her color, among other things. She would turn just about as fast as flipping on a light switch in how brightly colored her body got and slowly go down as if she was a quick-to-anger mood ring. 

Rose was nice enough as monsters went though. She was the one that found Rey after all. Rey does her best to shake her head from those thoughts, honestly. The images are hazy at best and of all of it, she remembers the pain and abandonment. It’s not exactly anything she wants to remember, if she can avoid it that is. 

But the two of them had her working towards a new version of herself by the end of the next day, and finding out that being a ghost had its perks. 

Yeah… she thinks, the very thing that she was terribly afraid of came far sooner than she’d thought. It came to her through the warmth of her body heat escaping his lack thereof. He’d held her close for what felt like forever and she promised herself to him…

Rey caught herself again, squeezing her eyes closed to remove the pain. She did not want to relive it, and no matter how many times she tried it was like her body was calling out to him, out to that night where it all changed, and Rey for one was sick of it. 

So what if she thought he loved her?

That was very clearly not it.

She was just some warm body he wanted, a snack he’d craved. There was no love story there. She’d been foolish. She’d read into his promises thinking they’d flowed deeper than the rivers that drained into the oceans only to be left in the cold. 

No, that wasn’t love.

That was the epitome of being used.

But Finn and Rose were different. Sure they bickered like an old married couple would but things were different here and Rey had no reason to assume that it meant they were together. 

Her first Halloween there marked her first year as a ghost and usual activities had her learning at a first year level. That in it of itself was a hard pill to swallow, if she could even do that anymore. First year monsters were literally just born creatures who were learning to move and take on the veil one monster print at a time. Being technically twenty three that year really made her put things in perspective; that she didn’t control her element as she thought she did, and that things can change in an instant. Not to mention a day old cyclops could hold objects and swing from tree branches like the other multiple limbed creatures which made her uneasy at the time.   
  
Rey simply could not see that her form made her unique and just because the other kids could do things an adult should have mastered already, didn’t mean she couldn’t, but it did still drag her down.

By the second year, life became easier thanks to Rose. Finn thought he was helping but no one really understood the constant movement within his oversized dorsal fin no matter how many times he urged her to look. The monster’s fin could help her look inside herself to find what it was she needed but even then she hadn’t been at one with herself. Rey knew she would be battling with her past for as long as she would be alive in the veil and hated it. She didn’t want to remember him. Not one more time. Not for a second. She just was over it… and that’s when she was offered a job as a teacher’s assistant in a fifth year class with Rose. 

Her friend decided that this would be the interactions she would need to start realizing herself. 

Fifth year students were just as old as Kindergarteners, and on many occasions, Rey would even slip and call them that. The first time it had gone unnoticed. The second time, little monsters looked at her queerly, wondering if she’d used a swearing tongue since Kindergarten was not a word in their vocabulary. The first youngster to repeat her said it and quickly hid underneath the rug as if he had hexed himself. The next pointed at a girl, right between the circle of her seven eyes, and shouted, “Kindergarten,” and the whole room erupted in screams and squeals electing a sigh from her friend.

“Ms. Niima,” she said, putting two tentacles together so that the suction cups lined up. 

This was her newest way to deal with the pain of squealing monsters. They really, and truly ruined her at times. Being a teacher for as long as she had, had to speak for something, but her loss of patience certainly wasn’t it. Just the squelching sounds of her suction cups made the kids go silent and Rey had to wonder what the hell her supernatural power was if just that sound worked.

“Yes, Ms. Tico?” Rey politely replied.

“Why don’t you explain that word to the class, if they can stop long enough to control themselves,” she said, pulling one of the pairs apart. 

“AH!” the little monsters all wailed, promising that they could, without a doubt.

“Great,” Rose said, pulling another one off for good measure. The rosey color in her tentacles showed just how she was handling her frustration, then nodded to Rey to speak up. 

“Well,” Rey began, floating around the room to turn the lights off and gathering the youngsters in a close cluster. “When I was alive…”

Rose pulled another pair of suction cups just to keep the class quiet. It was obvious that she did die, being a ghost, but fifth year monsters don’t specifically see those differences and only what they can do versus others. 

“The students I taught were humans,” Rey paused as another crack filled the classroom. “When they were in their fifth year like you, they were just beginning school.” 

Two then three more cracks followed suit but Rose did her best to allow the rest of this. 

“They were called Kindergarteners. They learned how to read and write English and some other worldly languages, unlike the several thousand you all will be learning here in the veil but it’s a big deal to be one. There are so many projects, art, and story time, games, and don’t get me started about holidays!” she chirped, ignoring the sound of Rose’s suction cups. “There are so many and events for each, but my very favorite has always been Halloween. It’s a time where the students get dressed up like their favorite monsters and heroes and heroines. There are parties, and candy for knocking on doors and saying, ‘Trick or Treat’ too!”

Before she could think wiser of it, Rey offered to take the class, if their parents permitted, back into the human world for one night to find out just how great being a human kid was. 

Chaos broke out in the classroom. None of the youngsters could calm themselves, and none of Rose’s rolling waves of suction snapping tentacles could bring them to order. 

\-----

“Just what in the inferno do you think you’re doing inviting a class of fifth year students out with you in the living world?” Rose hissed her color burning hotter than her usual stop. 

Rey gulped, or tried to. There was really no way to swallow anything which honestly did nothing for her figure.

“You are an aid! Which means you can’t go alone,” Rose whined, sagging back into her chase lounge. “Halloween is huge here, you know this. There’s so much to do… here! Why go back?”

Rey dropped her eyes wondering exactly that. The last two years have been phenomenal. Their Halloween’s were unreal, looking more like a monster themed MardiGras. 

“Oh I don’t know. I guess it just made me a little homesick. Fall is hard because I used to love it there, the sound of the crinkling leaves dragging across the pavement, spiced muffins and tea, free candy on that one night of the year. Not that I can enjoy it anymore or anything.”

Rey’s eyes fogged with what became the essence of a tear given she was no longer able to even make them.

“Sorry,” Rey muttered. “Given the way things are around here, I doubt any will look to go anyway.”

Rose nodded at her and they parted ways. 

____

The day had arrived and none of her fifth year students were in class. It wasn’t odd at all apparently either. Most were within other classrooms for electives and being shuttled to and from their little base of a classroom until the day was over. 

And not a single one came back with a permission slip that said their kids were able to go.

It was a huge relief considering she hadn’t thought of what it would be like to chase a bunch of fifth year students through the streets. What if it was hard? What if she had to use that suction cup pop thing rose did to keep them in line? She’d have no chance then, Rey thought.

It was just better this way. 

By evening, Rey floated to the edge of the veil to the same dark, abandoned house she had gone to each year since her change. There she’d peer out for hours wondering if she’d be okay to move within the shelter of it. She wondered if anyone could see her or if they’d even care if she appeared if not only faintly you them. Would they stop and look? Or would they shrug off her existence? 

The sound of blowing leaves had been faintly before her, another invitation to just try and so with every fiber of the remainder of her being, Rey lunged forward, determined to give it a try. 

“Wait!” Several younglings called to the left of her. “Wait!” 

The first of the five year trio was Jannah. She was one of several long hair wickapups who were werewolves but kept to their old heritage, keeping their mane’s exceptionally long. Some even wore it over their eyes as they got older, but Jannah liked the barrette she fashioned out of an old bike helmet, presumably from the accidents that happened at Deadman’s Curve just before the light. 

Next to manage was Snap who acquired his nickname while imitating Ms. Tico, only to find out that his usually translucent body could give off a spectacular light show when he’d crack his pinchers. Brilliant yellow, green and purple lights would race up the exterior of his crustactious legs, pausing only for a beat as it communicated to continue the line at every joint until it warped through his belly. 

The final one to manage was Paige, a thin black gryphon who had been left back several years because of her underdevelopment. She had the brains of course, and was an excellent hunter, but her size and bony figure had her in a terrible position for moving up. It was a shame, but her third fifth year, being alongside Ms. Niima truly helped the both of them evolve into more curious versions of themselves, which in turn meant more adventures. 

“Wait,” they finally said together. 

Rey looked at all of them with bewilderment. 

“You said if our parents didn’t mind that we could go with you. I had to wait forever for mine to wake up,” Jannah said. “Paige’s Mom deferred to mine when she heard Ms. Tico wasn’t taking us.”

“Which means she likes you,” Paige added quietly. 

Jannah nodded, then added, “And Snap here, he’s from a home, you know. His ‘brother’ signed and he’s well over two hundred years old. So… we’re good.”

Rey frowned as she thought it over. She did say she’d take them… and she did know that Kindergarteners could wreak havoc on human kind if they didn’t get what they wanted. Who knew what three actual monsters could do.

She took a moment to look out at the rickety old house one more time before looking back at their hopefully multicolored eyes. They were so hopeful and bright, and it did feel good that Paige’s mom trusted her, so she sighed, charmed each of their permission slips, then reached for their hands before saying, “Alright. But, the moment I don’t feel right about this, we turn back. Your safety is my number one concern.”

[ ](https://ibb.co/X3FkbxN)


	2. Chapter 2

Their safety was not her only concern though. The thought of something happening to them while they were out or not being able to get back in time that the veil had closed off to them was a frightening one. It was unsettling enough to try to force herself to breathe, something she hasn't been able to do in years.

“Is everything alright?” Jannah asked, keen to her change. 

“Uh, yes. I mean, we’re… everything’s going to be fine,” Rey assures Jannah and ignores the very fact that her kind could scent ghosts of every ectoplasmic label, and know when they were in a sense, full of shit. 

But Jannah sniffed around her instead, her long curls bounced heavily around her face, save for her soundly fastened barrette. She continued along the known variegated fray the veil created during the evening searching for the best possible exit point. 

Rey watched as her tail began to point when she found the exact spot she’d expected to pass through on her own. 

“Smells abandoned,” she started. “Water…” she sniffed again, “mold, mostly mold, wood’s rotted...we should sneak around the building.”

“The veil is weaker there though. What if you get hurt?” Rey asked. 

“I can carry them through,” Paige promised. “Hardest will probably be Snap, honestly. He’s big and awkward.”

“I am not awkward!” he bellowed, his echo carrying further out than he’d expected. The boy sank his body down into the size of a compact stone, less his legs and claws. 

“Are too,” Paige shut her mouth the second Rey turned to her. 

“He might be a little too much for you, and I don’t know if I can help. I still haven’t been able to hold anything,”

Rey complained.

“We’ll we’re not giving up,” Jannah replied, “there’s got to be a way to move throughout it. I mean, there haven’t been people in it for years, and there’s enough monstrous energy to keep this point comfortably open rather than having to cross by boat miles north of here.”

Rey weighed her options again but found no other way. Through was the safest and still safer than that was to make sure the plans hadn’t fallen through. Monsters were like elephants. They remembered everything. The date, time, ambience, and especially how yellow someone was and that was simply worse than getting caught in the shifting veil.

Rey was not yellow… and probably how she found herself in this predicament 

“Alright. Through it is. Snap, fold yourself up, please.”

“What? No, I can get through just fine. I have hollow bones!” Snap challenged.

“Snap! If you are the reason I don’t get any peanut butter sweets tonight, I’m feeding you to my pack!” Jannah snarled. 

“Oh woah,” Rey interrupted. 

“Just make yourself small,” Jannah ordered, stalking off towards the back porch of the darkened home. 

Snap mouthed off as he made his way back towards the group, his body shrinking down in size as they expected. Jannah swiped him up by the collar, what was still exposed at least, and made off with him, leaving Paige and Rey to share a bewildered look before flying after them. 

“You’re gonna break it, let go!” Snap roared despite making it onto the back porch and past the open door frame. 

These places are supposed to be strongholds, safe houses, and yet Rey can feel fear here. She wonders if it’s the house that feels it, what with them barging in as they were, or if it’s the rush of being human and practically tiptoeing around this place. There was something about it that was unsettling though. It was as if this place was still living, at least weakly. Rey frowned at the thought, tailing the kids through what looked like an old kitchen. The ice box had been torn apart. The door flung against the adjacent wall. There were sizable holes left around it as well which Rey could only wonder what was so terrible that someone could do such a thing. 

A card table laid upside down in the small kitchen, while two chairs lay broken around the room as well. Broken windows and tile at the counter makes it look as though there had been a fight that no one won, and that wasn’t remotely all. Throughout the house, Paige walked on her claws and talons, afraid to let her wings flap. She was sure she’d summon the evil that had been within it if even a feather slid against an item there. Snap couldn’t deal with being in the dark for long and forced his body to surge with light, despite not snapping his huge claws. 

“Stahp,” Jannah grumbled.

The waves of iridescent color softly lit the ground below them leaving the group with only more questions. None of which had been about what candies they thought they’d be getting but more about Rey and if this house was hers. 

Before a breath of them came out, a gust of wind blew behind them. It was strong enough to rattle windows and broken glass from picture frames and fallen lamps making their group hustle through the rest of it, finding a sitting room, mud room, then the front door and finally the blinding light of a street lamp pouring down over them. 

“Ah,” Snap whined, “you put bite marks in my collar! My brother’s are gonna make fun of me.”

“They don’t already?”

“Shut up,” he huffed and to his surprise, Jannah had no comebacks. 

Instead the pup wagged her tail in response to the masses walking around them in their shabby costumes. She howled once or twice the moment Rey explained something had to stick together for you for kids who couldn’t use zippers. 

“They’re made poorly, mostly. It’s a one time thing. And then people toss them away until next year,” she adds. 

“Sounds wasteful to me,” Paige starts. 

“It is,” Rey nodded looking back over the sea of people towards the house for the final time before trying to get a hold of this evening. It would only be a few hours she told herself and then she could creep through the house again, looking for the answers she’d believed she found at least hints too. 

“Alright,” she began, “We should probably have a plan… before we…” Rey trailed, not finding her little monsters in front of her anymore. 

They left? Fifth year did not just leave. They knew better. Fifth year would get it from… Rose. They’d get it from Rose. If Rose were here they’d be right alongside her following her every move but no. She had to believe that they’d be good. 

Rey craned her head back to rest them on her shoulder as she used to do as if it would relieve the stress that she very clearly could feel. That was an electrical shock, much like the faint ones that would go off here and there as her ghostly form decided how much of her she’d be able to embody. When she first started as one, she barely could organize it enough to look like anything but a spectral white orb. As time went on, she’d been able to keep at least half her form, leaving a ragged looking skirt to flow from her waist on. Stress would shock her places, usually up and down what would be her spine until she at least tried managing it.

Up above her she found Paige, perched on top of the street lamp and with the other two gone and no way to blow a sigh of relief, Rey floated up to be alongside her. 

“Thank you for not running off like Jannah and Snap,” she started.

“Oh, they’re not really gone. They went to snatch up a bucket for me to carry while they stole candy from the kids.”

“Oh thank the Maker!” Rey shouted her relief. “Can you see them?”

Paige rolled her eyes. Of course she could see them. She had eagle eyes and gryphons could see for miles upon miles. 

She pointed with her talon towards the right where Jannah was using her speed to run through the crowd, looking for a sizable container that Paige could hold their loot while Snap softly clicked and clacked away, seizing looks as he went which in turn kept eyes off of his partner in crime. It took several blocks before they came upon the most amazing item to use. 

It was plastic, so not too heavy when filled, she figured. White, with two arms and three black dots on it that the kids associated with “a bad design”. None of which knew that it was what humans associated with ghosts and that was completely fine with Rey. As tasteless as it was, she didn’t need to bring it up with them. 

Paige assumed the position while Jaina strapped the thing around her back with a few other items they found, like a hose she most obviously got tangled up in, thanks to her claw and bite marks, and what looked like a garden shovel and hand rake. 

“What do you plan on doing with that?” Rey asked.

Jannah simply scooped into one passing sack with a shovel, eating the treats whole, wrapper and all. 

“The claw isn't great though. I’ve noticed they don't work as well as ours to rip through the cloth ones, but if you swipe it off of a wagon while no ones looking, we could load up that house and take all we want back through the veil.” 

“No, no… the point of this was to go on an adventure and see what human kids do.” Rey said, watching the three of them smile slowly, then shake their heads collectively. “So you came for candy, eh?”

“Sorry, Miss Rey but we smell it every year and never have it. It’s why we came.”

Rey nodded the best she could, looked again at the house, before looking back at them. She knew she should go back and take them home, but Rey knew all about not getting to do what the other kids got to and figured she’d show these kids how to do it the right way. 

\-----

“You do what?” Snap snorted. 

“I… I don't feel comfortable going up to the door, Ms. Rey. Can’t I just…” Jannah began. 

“Just look at the other kids. See them? They go door to door saying the special code for candy. Do you remember it?” Rey asked. 

“Trick or Treat!” Paige squawked excitedly. 

“I still don’t understand how that’s even a rewardable saying,” Snap continued. 

“Do they want a trick? Is that why we say that? I can trick them. I can…” Jannah stopped speaking the moment a taller kid looked her over. 

“How are you doing that with your mouth?” the boy asked, looking a little too close to her muzzle, his finger kept pointing towards it looking for a button.

“Their costumes are engineered…” Rey spat out. The boy wearing the soft sewn Iron Man costume snapped back to look at her.    
  
Rey kept her form steady, doing little to no movement at all in response. 

“Yeah? And how are you doing that?” he snapped, ready to reach through her as well. 

  
Rey found herself moving away from him, assuring him that his parents didn't make enough money to repair the technologies she’d equipped tonight and if he felt the need to touch any of her entities, she’d personally ruin him over it. 

“Yeah, okay lady,” the boy huffed, backing away from her, then taking a swipe at the candy bucket making Paige rear back onto her hind legs. Her screech was alarming enough it had set off every car within a block or two while Rey challenged him again with a warning look. 

No sooner did he leave that Rey’s fifth year class gathered up around her, thanking her for her monstrous performance, assuring her that they’d tell their parents. 

Her group chatted on and on about it among themselves back up to the first house, where they stood… and stood… and stood. 

“What was the first thing we…” Paige started to ask. 

“Pound the door,” Snap said, tapping the doorbell’s ring. “My claw is too big. I cant tap the button to get it to…” he trailed. 

Jannah turned her head to him slowly, maintaining eye contact as he did. “You have the biggest claws, you can’t just tap the door in front of you?”

“I can tap you,” he hissed as a group of teenagers approached the door laughing about what he’d said. 

“I dunno man, she does not look like your type,” one said among them, “Whatever you are,” before bending down to loot the candy bowl to the side of the porch. 

Snap had enough going on in his life and did not need to hear that. Who did that whiny punk think he was anyway?

Rey watched as the three of them practiced what the group before them did, heading over to the bench where the home had flowers, a really big pumpkin and an empty dish. Jannah began to growl, turned and looked for the boys who had just been there. 

Paige softly asked, “Trick or Treat?” in the space around them, then backed up quickly at the sound of a rumbling tube above them. “What?”

Large candy bars tumbled out of the tube, landing at their feet. Rey remembered this being a huge thing to get such a fantastic treat back from saying those three words, but there she was watching shock come across their faces as several different kinds of bagged chocolate treats and nougat bars fell at their feet. 

“Thank you,” the three of them cried out to a chuckling woman at the end of the line. 

\------

Candy is a bigger problem than what Rey expected it to be. 

It barely made it to the shared bowl on Paige’s back. 

The moment the sugary treat had made it to their claws, Jannah had already opened each of them, and fed them to the others being the fact that she had thumbs one, and two, after Rey explained they needed to unwrap the treats before they ate them, it just made saving the treats that much harder. 

Jannah for one is hyperactive on the stuff and Rey has desperately tried to intercept her, but she’s just too fast. Paige has had her share, can’t walk straight and keeps getting frightened by her tail. And now she has Snap in a smaller size after he’d thrown up, trying to ride in the bucket attached to Paige. 

“Maybe we should go back,” Rey said, wishing she could stroke Snap’s shell for reassurance. He’d been so uncomfortable after the last few blocks and even buried a few landmines along the way towards the end of the block. 

“There’s just one more, Mzzzzz. Rey,” Paige complained. 

“And there are eight for you to walk back from. I cant lift you either,” Rey stops speaking at the sound of another wrapper squealing open. Foil slides off of the body of the chocolate, rendering Rey speechless. 

There flapping just above Paige’s head was a bluish black colored body the size of a pin cushion. It’s eyes were black, his ears were enormous and soft looking, all the while, the creature stared them down while he continuously shucking off the wrapper as it went. 

“We’ve been out for too long,” Rey says finally. “ I’m starting to see things for Maker’s sake.”


	3. Chapter 3

Grumbles came from everyone but it had been very obvious that this night had to come to a close. Snap alone had her worried and somehow they’d collected a few strays along the way. Something about the way that one scruffy looking dog looked, made her worried that Jannah was scenting things and leaving her mark on this world… and that wouldn’t do. What would happen if something living came back with them?

Rey shook her head… they were living, the monsters were, but it was different. It was so different.

And what about this candy eating bat? Rey frowned, returning to watching him struggle to eat the kiddie sized bar while flapping along with them. 

“I can’t imagine why you would want that,” she finally offers some sort of conversation with the creature. “I thought bats ate bugs and fruit.”

The little bat looked as though it was frowning at her which made her wonder if they could. Dogs could. Monsters obviously could. Cats? Those could without a doubt… but anything else had Rey drawing a blank all the way back to the streetlamp that brought them there. 

“Miss Rey?” Snap asked weakly, “I have to leak…” 

Snaps voice carried through the air as soon as he’d spoken. Paige reared and bucked wildly to get him off of her then rolled to the side and shook. 

“What was all that about?” Rey asked as she came to Snaps side, still unable to comfort him. 

Jannah ran in the other direction too, closer to the streetlamp, carefully walking around it as she went. 

“Stop marking things,” Rey added. “You’re too young for that.”

Jannah’s ears perked up then fell flat against her head, a show of annoyance settling over her brow showed Rey just where she sat with her right now. At first she’d been taken back by it but then, with a vote of confidence from herself, Rey challenged her. 

“I’m not your Momma or part of your pack but all these other dogs see is something that smells good that they’re looking to take advantage of,” she said, watching Jannah’s ears perk up, then flatten again. “And I can’t do a damn thing about it.”

“You could scare them,” offered a voice from the darkness. 

“Yeah, can’t you fly through them? Mess up their insides?” Snap asked as a clear liquid began soaking into the ground below. 

“Like a wraith? Ms. Rey isn’t a wraith,” Jannah said flatly. “She’s a spirit girl that was left with us. She can’t do that.”

“Right,” Rey replied. “Which is why I have to say the hard words and make you think.”

“Ms. Rey?” Paige whispered nervously. Her form bounced uncomfortably, side to side while her eyes pointed at the ground below them. 

Rey’s gaze dropped slowly to catch what Paige had been on about, then quicker at the size of the growing hole in the ground. 

“What the hell?”

Silence stretched around them at the sound of those three words. What was a normal vocabulary to her was not to them. In fact, even mentioning hell opened the proverbial gates to it, and all three of the fifth year monsters seized up in horror. 

Rey, though, had to laugh. No such thing ever happened on earth or there would have been fire pits every four inches of each other, what with how often the term had been used. The Devil himself would have decided to rename hell to anything else by the first few uses, she’s sure of it. When she finally did stop, she couldn't help but notice the sizable pothole underneath the boy. 

“Is that liquid pure acid?” she asked.    
  
“Kind of. It’s hard to explain, but it will destroy everything it touches,” he finally gets up to stand on all eight of his claw tips, stretching out as he does. 

“And, you’re better now?” Rey questioned cautiously. 

“I’ll be better after my loaf is done,” he said as a matter of factly and Rey stopped herself from asking that question. 

“It’s nothing like this,” he waves around at the hole he created. “That will absorb the Earth’s minerals and become a hotspot for nutrients for plant life. It’s why home is preferred by every-monster.”

Paige nodded, “This was fun though, Ms. Rey. I’ve never seen so many human kids before or worked as an asset as well as I did tonight.”

Rey smiled at her, “I may need you to be another asset tonight, that is if Jannah…” Rey looked around for her noticing she’d already begun to slink inside. “Ah, we need to get her a bell.”

Paige stifled her laughter and followed the group of them in as they lined up to deal with the stress of the home once more. Rey made sure to follow up the group so that no humans or animals decided to happen to come along. Her low white light lit the floor softly, less so than that of Snap’s iridescent glow, but it was a welcome one, regardless. 

Paige’s wings folded closed, a show of comfort in her space which was nice to see. Not that this home could ever be comforting, not in its current state at least, but Paige was progressing well, her tail swished carefully in the space, showing her confidence in herself, which was huge. Snap kept snapping his claws, keeping the light show in his legs on so that they could see, something he was having more and more fun with in the space. 

“Did you hear that?” he asked joyfully.

“What?” whispered Paige as she kept a keen eye to her surroundings. 

“I get a second crack if I hold my claw open for long enough,” he turns to show Paige, gleefully entranced with the way a new set of purple marks glow around that joint. 

Just as he’s ready to snap it, his eyes trail over to meet Paige’s but lift to Rey’s then higher, nearly to the ceiling. His head tilts back far enough to put them on alert, turning slowly to find the large dark figure behind them. 

Jannah makes it out and to the back porch, unaware of the commotion behind her. She cannot believe what her teacher said to her, especially after… after the night they had. It was supposed to be fun. She was supposed to screw with animals and people alike. Keep those weirdos looking for clues to how werewolves come around, if they’re after their pets or them when they do… “ew,” she said out loud to her own commentary, before heading off the porch. 

One paw down onto the stair had her thinking though. Ms. Rey had been there all night. She showed her true self, even if Jannah didn't want to hear it… she grumbled again at herself, then at the situation before turning back to check on her trailing group. 

A gust of wind flew through the home as it did the first time, throwing Snap, then Paige out the door frame. They would have landed right on top of her if she hadn’t ducked. The two squealed as they flew, then whined as they landed in the tall grass on top of the other. 

“Don’t snap, Snap!” Paige screached, panting as she struggled to get away from him. Her throat had been very clearly crossed between the most deadly part of him, freaking her out further. 

“I’m a monster not a killer, Paige. I can control it, you know,” he replied. 

“I…” Paige sniffled, then shook her head. 

“Sorry. I didn't mean it like that.”

“No, you did. It’s fine. I…”

“Guys?” Jannah finally broke up Paige’s anxiety attack to order another. “Why is Ms. Rey still in there?”

Their gazes followed Jannah’s, just over her shoulder and up the three rickety stairs of that old porch to see their teacher, Ms. Rey, pressed up against it as if a barrier had been there all this time. 

“Wait!” the three of them shouted, and then she was gone.

Swallowed by the darkness that followed. 

\-----

Rey stood in the door frame looking out into the veil, challenged by the darkness that very clearly wanted to consume her. In a way, she let it. There was a window of time that she could have made it out that open door, but that would have meant leaving one of the kids and that just wouldn’t do. 

They still had their whole lives to live. 

And she simply put, did not. 

This was her afterlife, Rey dropped her head to her chest at the thought of that. What kind of life did she have if she couldn't remember the most traumatic part?

When she finally saw the little fifth year students scurry off into the mists, she finally asked, “Why am I here?”

A deep voice, similar to the one in the night that had answered them in the street, rang out softly in their space. It was different, commanding less dominance over her rather than his size. 

“You’re my guest,” he said.

“Guest?” she parroted. “Guests are invited…” Rey trailed realizing they’d used his place as a gateway twice without asking permission.

“Ah, but you were. Long ago, you were,” his voice hummed. “You don’t remember?”

Rey searched her thoughts but simply couldn't come up with an answer. Nothing about this space made her feel invited and yet she still felt something. 

“Do you?” she asked. 

Her host inhaled sharply. 

“I do. I remember everything there is to know about you,” he promised.

Rey frowned wondering if that was a trick. 

“What about me do you know?” she asked carefully. 

Her aura around her faded but with that so did his shadow. All that was left was the form of a very tall and wide man, she thought. Her head tilted slightly, taking in his features. None of which made him seem as though he was a monster. And he surely was not afraid of her where most would be. She swallowed, hoping for what, she didn't know. 

His hair was tousled but styled that way, she assumed to offset the angularness of the rest of him. That and the smattering of moles over his brow and cheeks helped as well, but for the most part, he was tall and built like a house. A human house. That is, until she watched him pull out a small candy from his pocket. There he played with the foil then said, “These were your favorite.” 

Rey couldn't help the way she choked on her reply, “What?”

“You used to hide every last one of them and eat the chocolate off of the mousey inside like a squirrel,” he said, biting his lip and revealing the sharp teeth that told her just what he actually was. 

Rey didn’t know any vampires. She didn't know any monsters before all of this. Not a single one!

“I collected them all from your bucket,” he said shyly, hoping she’d realize who he was to her. “I thought maybe you would have. But you didn’t touch a single one.”

Rey swallowed. It was a sore spot for her and certainly not one that she wanted to bring up, but it was out of her before she could stop it. 

“I can't. I can't,” Rey repeated herself, waving her hand over the pile he pulled from his pockets. “I can't hold anything...can't touch it or eat, or… or…” 

The vampire before her nodded and set the candies on the floor next to him before rising to his feet once more. 

“Would you want to? If you could?” he asked carefully. 

If Rey could cry at the gesture she would have but instead she nodded, looked down at the pile and back to him. 

“I think anyone would,” her answer came out in a whisper. 

The man in front of her carefully raised his hand, his palm up to her in a silent request that she just trust him to make it better which seemed strange but given her afterlife so far, standing in this broken down, obviously haunted home, especially with her in it, she found herself softly sliding her hand in his. 

Memories, secrets, her story, his, theirs all move around her while he holds her there. She learns who she is in moments. What she loves, hates, and everything in between. She knows him, his face, his name… she was the vampire, he was a human and Maker, did he love her. He loved her so fiercely he begged her to turn him so they could live an eternal life together, forever… but something had gone wrong. She failed. She gave all of herself to him, giving him what he wanted but taking everything from him in the process. 

“Ben,” Rey gasped at the feel of her hand in his. Her breath came to her in short heaves before she realized she was in fact her physical self again. 

Her hands found her face racing falling tears across her cheeks before looking up at him again. 

“How?” she asked, her voice shuddering as she breathed, “How did you know?”

“How wouldn’t I have?” Ben replied. 

Rey shook her head, trying to take a step forward before falling towards him. Ben, though was quick to catch her, unphased by the way he managed to transfer life back to her. 

“I couldn't go back and forth into the veil. It… it’s not for us. Well, for vampires anyway. I could if I held you but when they took you, they took you from me,” he said, his own voice quaking as he spoke. “But you always came back to me, to our yard, and so I kept holding onto my dream that we’d be together again.”

She couldn’t help the swelling in her heart, the joy of knowing that there was a reason for this place and hanging around, but mostly for Ben, and the monsters in her life… Rey perked up nervously, looking just past him for her students. 

“What is it?” Ben asked, unwilling to let her go. 

“The little monsters that… did you blow them out of this house?” she asked, lifting her eyebrow at him. 

“It was the safest way,” he replied, his eyes widening as he did. “Honest. I would have carried them out but it would have scared them to be touched, I would think.”

“It was scary,” Rey assured him. Her own honesty is very clearly shown in her eyes. 

“I didn’t mean to scare you. I promise. I just… I couldn't watch you leave again. Tonight was the first time in two years you came through. I never wanted you to see our home like this but being cast out with no way to see you was like nothing else I’ve ever experienced…”

Rey nodded thoughtfully at that. Their home would need repairs to make it liveable again but before she can settle, she realizes, “Wait. You couldn't go into the veil at all?”

“No, it’s a wall. It cuts off certain parts of our home when it’s at its strongest. I cant tell you how many times I’ve flown down the stairs to get to sit on it and wait, or gone back to climb out the window and magically it’s not there anymore and,” Ben uses his hands to show how he’s fallen to the ground with a “splat!” for extra effects. 

She couldn't help the way she smiled, remembering how much he did that and how wonderful it was that he was so animated, but he answered her question fully making her realize now she could never go back. 

“How will I tell them? The kids. They’ll be so upset.”

Ben thought carefully before he spoke, offering up the best idea she’d heard in the longest time. 

“What if we bring the rest of Halloween to our doorstep, just for them? Then we can stand where the veil allows and promise that you’re alright and we’ll see them next Halloween?”

Rey smiled shyly, then planted a soft kiss at his lips, agreeing just as softly that it was a brilliant idea. 

And so that was just what they did. 


End file.
